Interview: Professor Mike Bourne
Motivating People
Steve Macaulay
Hello, I am Steve Macaulay and we are looking today at a
subject that is very important for managers and that is
motivating people. We are in the studio today with
Professor Mike Bourne. Mike has recently co-written a
book called Motivating People.
Now, Mike, question number one, why is it so difficult in a
business environment to motivate people?
Mike Bourne
I think it is difficult because it is actually a very complex
situation and it’s a very difficult thing to do. Motivation is
about getting people on board, getting them excited about
what you want to do and people have got their own
agendas, their own needs and wants. So motivation for me
is all about how do you get the organisation to deliver the
goals, but also how you take the people with you; and in the
modern environment when there are so many pressures that
is difficult to do.
Steve Macaulay
So it is OK when it is working well, but when it starts not to
work so well, or you are trying to continue the success, that
is when the trouble starts?
Mike Bourne
I think so. I think it is really easy to motivate people when
things are going swimmingly. Everybody is happy, there is
money to give out; there are lots of things. But when you
are in a crisis or when you are doing a big change that is
very difficult. I mean, the Post Office at present is a classic
example of trying to motivate staff when they are losing sixty
thousand in five years. It is almost an impossible task; it’s
not, but it is almost.
Steve Macaulay
I am going to try to unpack this a bit by looking at the
headings you use in the chapters. Now the first one is a
kind of base one that says it is about creating a motivating
environment; rule number one. What do you see as
constituting this motivating environment?
Mike Bourne
Well a motivating environment is immensely important
because what we know is that organisations with motivating
environments actually perform better than others. And it’s
all about three things. It is having the opportunity for people
to perform well and some environments don’t give that; so if
you know the budget doesn’t allow you to do it, the rules that
stop you doing certain things – front line staff who aren’t
Professor Mike Bourne
allowed to give the customer something that just defuses the
situation. That can destroy motivation. You have got to
have motivation itself, which is really about understanding
where you are going and people buying into the goals and
then you have got to have people with the skills and ability to
do it. It’s no good having really enthusiastic people if they
don’t know what they are doing and they don’t have the
skills to deliver; that is a disaster too. So its opportunity,
motivation and ability.
Steve Macaulay
Lets pick another area; building the right processes. Now, I
guess you mean by that things like payment systems,
setting key performance indicators. What other sorts of
things – appraisals I guess – the sort of familiar things that
you might say well every organisation has got those?
Mike Bourne
Every organisation has; some organisations do it an awful
lot better than others. Payment systems, for example, it is
very difficult to get a payment system right, so it actually
gets people to deliver the organisation’s goals. It’s much
more easy to criticise a payment system that is already in
place and pull it apart and say well it doesn’t do this and
that.
So the payment systems for me are quite critical, but what
are we going to link them through to? Is it just an overall
payment because the organisation has done well, people
sharing the success? And a lot of people like that because
it is seen as a thank you for a good year. Or are we
actually going to try and motivate a sales person to deliver a
particular sales target? And when you do that you have got
to look at well, how do we measure it? What level are we
going to set the target? Does the person who set that
target really feel they can achieve it? Because if they can
they will go for it, but if they can’t they may track out very
early and you have lost their motivation for the whole period
that the bonus is set. And companies have got to judge
those targets and be able to react quickly.
That is when times are good – it is quite easy to motivate
because you set a target and people achieve them and beat
them. When times are bad or times change suddenly, you
get targets that get out of reach very quickly and those are
very difficult to deal with. So you have got to be flexible and
be prepared to change and move.
Steve Macaulay
That brings us onto the skills of motivation. Now you and I
have probably worked for good bosses and bad bosses; it
seems to me that motivating bosses somehow kind of have
it in them, it’s an inherent thing and some people, almost
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November 2009
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Professor Mike Bourne
whatever they do, seem to get it wrong?
Mike Bourne
Yes, that’s interesting. I am thinking about the bosses I
have worked for in the past. I have worked for some really
good bosses; I have worked for some bosses who have not
been considered good in the organisation, but actually are
wonderful motivators of the people who work for them – they
really do a good job. And some of them do do it naturally,
but I think there are some basic skills that you can learn.
You have got to understand and feel what it is like for other
people. Most of us, if we just put ourselves in the position
of the other person for a few minutes before we start a
motivational dialogue and understand it from their
perspective, that just starts us thinking about how it would
feel for me if this was the message I was getting. And that
is a very good place to start. But there are other things that
you can do as well.
Steve Macaulay
One of the things that struck me that you say a number of
times in the book is about developing that climate of trust
and fairness that people in the end say well, he is looking
out for me; he is doing this in my best interests, I am being
treated fairly. How do you create that?
Mike Bourne
I think it is being honest and open about what is and isn’t
possible with people. You have got to encourage them, but
what is possible. If you have got somebody who is working
for you and they want to be the chief executive, is it realistic
that they are going to be the chief executive? Now you
don’t want to block their ambitions totally, but all you can
really talk about is whether they are promotable within the
organisation and can get to the next level and their future
career from there. And that is a first step and where it goes
from.
How do you do that? You do it talking about the next steps
because you can’t actually promise them a promotion; you
can’t promise them a promotion until the job arrives and
people actually vie with each other and the best person gets
that job. So you can only talk about the things that they
may do, the ways they may develop themselves to either get
that promotion in your organisation, or possibly outside.
And you have got to be realistic about that.
And I think too, you probably have got to give bad news. If
things are not going to happen quite in the timescales that
people believe, then you have got to make them aware of
that. On the other hand, if you can make them happen in
the timescales, you have got to do your damnedest to make
sure that works and works for them.
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November 2009
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Professor Mike Bourne
Steve Macaulay
Now we are probably in one of the situations that you
describe in the book, in the chapter that says Motivating in
Difficult Situations. You mention things like change, team
work and project teams, underperformance, working at a
distance – which of those do you think is probably most
relevant at the moment?
Mike Bourne
I mean a lot of people are working at a distance, but really at
the moment it’s change isn’t it? People have got an
environment that is changing very rapidly. One of the
benefits that we have got at present is that people
understand that; we have got a recession going on, so
people understand that change is necessary. But they want
to know why the change is happening. If they don’t
understand why the change is happening there is no reason
for them to buy into it whatsoever.
They have also got to understand a little bit of what is in it for
them. Now there may be nothing in it for them and they
have got to know that, but quite often it is about the future of
the organisation, the future of the business and some of the
people who are going to be there are going to survive and
going to go with it and grow. And that is the future. Some,
unfortunately, you are going lose along the way.
People do resist change. We talk about communication a
lot and you have got to tell people why change is happening.
But people sometimes resist it because they believe that
what you are proposing won’t actually give you what you
think you are going to get. And if that is the case, you have
really got to listen to that because they may be right and you
may be wrong. And as a manager you a little bit further
away from the customers than your first line staff and so you
need to listen to those objections in a constructive way.
They are not always right, but you may get some wonderful
feedback that you can then use to integrate into what you
are doing.
So communication can just be a loud voice coming – you
know, we are doing this – people understand why and then
getting involved in how it is going to happen and some of the
things that affect them, especially the small personal things.
That is the way I think we have got to do it in these times.
Steve Macaulay
One of the interesting things, picking up on that area of
listening, is to say that you end up with a motivation score
card – four areas that you want people as managers to
check out at regular intervals. What briefly are those
areas?
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Professor Mike Bourne
Mike Bourne
Well, you have got to think about how well I am motivating
my people – that is really clear. Just reflect every now and
again on last month, what went on? How did it happen?
You have got to think too about what the people are doing.
Are the people who are working for you actually developing?
Is this happening, or is this not happening in my
organisation? Because people, they may be delivering the
goals but are they actually having the benefit themselves?
Are they growing in their job? Are they learning new skills?
Are they preparing for the future? Are they preparing for
the future of the business and their own future? And so on.
Steve Macaulay
Mike, thank you very much.
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November 2009
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